Dhana and I followed the rest of the family members into an adjacent room.
After the Dukes and the General arrived, they wanted to have the meeting room for themselves and we were thrown out.
I took a glance at the two newly arrived Dukes and the General.
Duke Varah. He was also a muscular man. Almost similar to Duke Kurma in terms of his physical appearance. Except, that he is more ragged and he carried two large sabers on his back. Also, he was much more taller than Duke Kurma.
He had a bronze complexion and had brown hair. He wouldn't be considered traditionally handsome and no princess was imagining him when she dreamt of prince charming.
Duke Ugra. He was much leaner and shorter compared to the other two. But in terms of strength and power, he was better than those two Dukes. He is a Knight, but he doesn't use any weapons. He had that beastly aura around him that gave an appearance of a predator.
Unlike the other two Dukes, he didn't have any luxurious armor, no ornaments and even the thin robe he was wearing was thin and old. On the first glance, one would never associate him with the word Duke.
Finally, the General. The person in charge of the Western Borders of the Daksh Kingdom. General Garud.
Well versed in Land and aerial warfare. Started out as a soldier, earned every single one of his ranks. Despite being from an ordinary background and constantly subjected to discrimination and some internal politics. He rose the ranks.
He was the only one who kept the barbarians of the western lands out of there.
As three of them entered, we had to leave.
I was really tempted to let some spirits in to listen in on the conversation, but I couldn't. The Dukes can easily spot them and I wasn't ready to handle the consequences.
Dhana and I sat in a corner.
We were occasionally taking a glance at Ardra. The man was burning with anxiety. He was eyeing us now and then and almost walked up to us, but he stopped in his tracks.
He was very anxious about learning whatever information we had about the man in black's actions in the valley.
"What now? Do we wait until he cracks and see if he can show us a way to send the message to Duke Paras?" I asked Dhana.
"That is only way. Meanwhile, we can only wait and see if that guy really comes here and does as he said."
"The Wind Spirit King warned me that he will come. I am inclined to believe him." I muttered and sighed. All of a sudden, I remembered something.
"That head of the village? What happened to him? Did you break the curse on him?"
Dhana nodded and said.
"I almost forgot about him too. But there wasn't much information about him. We looked through his memories.
The man named Janis and the village head indeed clashed multiple times. The village head used all kinds of tactics against Janis, but he wasn't able to take him down.
After some time, he met someone and used their help to kill Janis. That is all we had. The suspicious part is that he doesn't remember the face of the person he met, he doesn't have any memory on how exactly he killed Janis.
Did he burn him? Did he crush his head? No Idea. He doesn't even remember where exactly he killed the man.
We could try and investigate it more, but even before that, you already found that guy and you know the rest."
"This fucking sucks."
I cursed under my breath.
The day passed quietly. We couldn't get anymore information and even the set up I had with all those little animals didn't amount to much. There was little to no information gained from them. Apart from the security set up of the mountain, there is no valuable information.
Soon it was night.
Everyone was anticipating the arrival of that man. But he didn't come.
However, around midnight something else happened.
A message came to Duke from the Anta Duchy's Mage association. I previously mentioned how the communication between different places work, right? The Anta family is done for, so they cannot communicate with other areas.
The mage association was still standing and they contacted the Kurma Duchy. Not just the Kurma Duchy, later I found out that they contacted even the Headquarters hurriedly and the whole city was on red alert.
Because, the Anta Duchy that was not invaded by any creature for decades has been invaded that night.
Duke Kurma came running back with that information and another short meeting was convened between the Dukes and the General.
After that meeting was over, Duke Ugra, Duke Varah and General Garud hurriedly ran out of the estate and travelled south in the direction of Anta.
I didn't know any information yet, but I had a bad feeling. Dhana shared the same feeling and ran to Duke Kurma.
"What happened, Sir? Why are they leaving?"
"I cannot deal with you guys right now. Please just go back and rest. Everything related to this, is purely on a need to know basis and trust me, you don't need to know this."
I looked at Dhana's expression and knew that she had it enough. The Duke was constantly putting us down and brushing us off.
"I don't need to know? I am the fucking case officer of this incident. I was the one investigating this case and Tej was the one who tracked him down.
I don't know what gave you the right to talk down to me and keep things from me like this. But, I am sure of one thing.
You are not my superior and I haven't gotten any orders from the superior to stay in your Duchy."
She paused and took out a crystal. A recording crystal to be exact. As I said, there were instruments to record videos and they were very popular among the investigators of that time.
"Now, I am demanding you in the name of investigation bureau. What do you know about the culprit and why are you hindering our investigation by holing us up here? What is you relationship with the culprit?
On what basis are you hindering our right to communicate with our superiors?"
Duke's face turned red. His veins were ready to pop and his aura raged. To my surprise, instead of backing down, magic circle appeared on Dhana's palm. She might be weaker than him, but she was ready to throw hands.
"DHANA."
At this moment, someone yelled and diverted our attention. The tension broke a bit. It was Dharma. He was still pale and a bit weak, but nothing some rest wouldn't recover.
"You are safe." I sighed in relief.
Dhana just looked at him and Dharma shook his head.
"I apologize Duke, this might appear out of line, but it was not right stop us from communicating with our superiors. We are of no help to you here. If the superiors really say that we should stay here, then we will do exactly that."
"Otherwise?"
"We will need to go and act based on their orders."
"You are constantly spouting superiors this, superiors that. From what I know, Dhana only needs to report to Duke Paras, the King and the Royal Guard. Are you planning on contacting them right now? I already told them, that the orders are from the King."
"How are we supposed to believe you?" Dharma asked directly. Duke kurma however didn't react like I expected. I thought he would blow his own head off once again, but he just gritted his teeth and asked.
"Are you questioning if I am giving false orders under the King's name?"
"Duke Kurma, I am sure that I am speaking for all three of us when I say that we appreciate your help in saving us from there.
If you haven't come, I don't know how long we could have survived.
However, think of this from our perspective, from what I gathered, the culprit called you by your first name, which only a select few individuals know of. Even most of the official records don't hold your first name.
You suspiciously blocked our access to the outside world after we gained this bit of possible connection between you and the culprit.
What would you do, if you are in our shoes?" Dharma acted calm and maybe because he was son of Duke Paras, Duke Kurma held the discourse.
"Then how do you explain the appearance of the other Dukes and the General? Are you going to say, they are in on it too?"
"No, I won't. But I will ask you to explain, why the Dukes and general left after a few hours? Why are they not here to defend the city here?"
The conversation went on and on. The Duke held his hammer a couple of times, almost wanting to smash the shit out of all three of us, but soon he was worn out.
"Alright, I will tell you some information. You guys better shut the fuck up and go back there. We might not be attacked today. So, you will be arranged some rooms. Stay there and shut it until I say you are ready to go."
All three of us exchanged a glance and nodded.
"I still cannot reveal the information about that person. All I can tell you is that the information about him is secret to the point ninety percent of the Royalty also don't know about him.
He shouldn't be here and his actions against Anta were uncalled for. We couldn't have expected it to happen in a million years.
We still believe that he will come to Kurma City."
"Why? What made you strongly believe that? Just based on his words?"
"Yes, purely based on his words. No other proof is needed."
We were dumbfounded. But the duke continued.
"His appearance in the Kingdom raised so many questions and even the King is a bit anxious. Duke Paras was already informed and he will be arriving in the Kingdom in two to three days.
As for why these Dukes left….
Anta is under attack. We don't know if the culprit is the one doing the attack, but we are sure that he is the reason behind it. They went there to check on the situation and if he is there, they will deal with him.
I would have gone, but if he was using Anta as distraction, then he will come here.
I need to defend the city while the Dukes come back."
"Anta is under attack?"
I exclaimed. That was another dreadful development.
"Yes, now you go back to your rooms. Duke Paras might even visit here soon. You can talk to him then and get out if he deems so. Until then, you are my responsibility."
We left all three of us drowned in our own thoughts. At that moment, something hit me. The signal from the bird. I closed my eyes and concentrated. In the hidden room, Ardra was there again.
He hurriedly sent a message.
"Anta was attacked. My father, Dukes and the General were very panicked. I only managed to hear a part of their conversation, but I am sure they mentioned something like 'came from the sea'. They also believe this is related to the Culprit."
The message was sent and a reply came briefly.
"It seems like things are getting complicated. Get some more information from those investigators. I have a hunch on what that guy might be doing. But I need to confirm it. We cannot take any action without that. Anyway, the help is already after that man, if everything goes well, he will die and we can bury this matter."
I opened my eyes. Dhana and Dharma were looking at me in askance.
"Let's go, we need to talk in private."